Aids Safety, Sexuality and Risk

Some 12 years into the epidemic, with an effective preventive vaccine or therapy against HIV disease still to be found, this book reflects on the contributions of social and behavioural research to the development of interventions for prevention. After over a decade's work documenting HIV and AIDS-related knowledge, attitudes and behaviour, social researchers have begun to focus more clearly on perceptions of sexual safety and risk, and the factors that contribute to these. The issues addressed by the book were examined during three major conferences in 1994: the annual conference of the British Sociological Association, the 2nd International Conference on the BioPsychoSocial Aspects of AIDS and the Xth International Conference on AIDS. The book brings together key papers presented at each of these conferences, documenting issues of focal concern to social researchers, policy makers and health educators in the mid-1990s.

Preventative measures - Strategies for avoiding the epidemic and perceptions of risk; HIV-related discrimination in medical teaching texts; Holidays abroad and sexual health risks; Sexual behaviour in gay men: towards a sociology of risk; Framing difference: sexuality, AIDS and organisation; Trials and tribulations: the effectiveness of interventions to prevent HIV; Making partnerships work between communities and governments; Socially apart youth and AIDS; Sex, drugs, intervention and research: from the individual to the social; personal responsibility without personal control; AIDS, HIV and the culture of certainty; Sex, love and HIV: the impact of an HIV positive diagnosis on sexual relationships; One of us, one of them, or one of those? The construction of identity and sexuality in relation to HIV/AIDS; Sexuality, identity and community; Discourses of power and empowerment in the fight against AIDS in Africa.